15 October 2007
Aribert Heim, one of the most wanted Nazi war criminals thought to be still alive and at large, was hunted down and killed by a Jewish death squad in 1982. In a book published this week, Danny Baz, a retired colonel in the Israeli air force claims that the Austrian concentration camp doctor was tracked down in the United States and shot dead by a group called "The Owl'', whose members, including Baz, were Israeli and American military veterans. Heim is known as the ‘Butcher of Mauthausen’ after carrying out barbaric medical experiments on inmates in the Nazi camp. After World War II he served only two years in jail before resuming work as a gynaecologist in the German city of Baden-Baden.
Alerted of his imminent arrest, Heim disappeared in 1962 and has never been seen since – though there have been alleged sightings over the years in Egypt, Uruguay, Chile and, most recently, in Spain. The Simon Wiesenthal Center has placed him second on its list of targets under ‘Operation Last Chance’ – a final effort to track down Nazi criminals, and the Austrian government has offered compensation for information leading to his arrest. If alive, Heim would now be 93.
"When he was dead, I felt like an ambassador for all the children who died in the war,'' Baz told the French newspaper ‘Le Figaro’. In the book “Ni oubli ni pardon” [No Forgetting, No Forgiving], Baz says that he joined "The Owl'' to avenge family members killed in the Holocaust. The group reportedly carried out several assassinations of Nazis who had sought refuge in the United States. However, the Simon Wiesenthal Center has cast doubts on Baz's claims, and Heim bank account in Germany continues to accumulate pension payments because he has never officially been declared dead. However, Baz has said he believes it is time to call off the hunt for Heim.
